“The HTC First, or ‘Facebook phone’ as many prefer to call it, is officially a flop,” Zach Epstein reports for BGR.

MacDailyNews Take: HTC Worst.

“It certainly wasn’t a good sign when AT&T dropped the price of HTC’s First to $0.99 just one month after its debut, and now BGR has confirmed that HTC and Facebook’s little experiment is nearing its end,” Epstein reports. “BGR has learned from a trusted source that sales of the HTC First have been shockingly bad. So bad, in fact, that AT&T has already decided to discontinue the phone.”

Epstein reports, “Our source at AT&T has confirmed that the HTC First, which is the first smartphone to ship with Facebook Home pre-installed, will soon be discontinued and unsold inventory will be returned to HTC. How much unsold inventory is there? We don’t have an exact figure, but things aren’t looking good. According to our source, AT&T sold fewer than 15,000 units nationwide through last week when the phone’s price was slashed to $0.99.”

MacDailyNews Take: Kintastic! The failure of this device means that, as difficult as it may be to believe, there’s still a glimmer hope. The Idiocracy may be further off than we would have thought before this news.

It makes us smile to think that hardly anybody wanted a mid-range phone focused on Facebook.

Downloaded FB Home for my Note 2 to check it out. Beautiful to look at, but beyond that there was no substance. I’m glad I’m able to uninstall it. I can’t imagine having had bought a phone and be locked into it for two years. I don’t know what Facebook was thinking. Piece of garbage!

iPad, iPod, Macbook Pro, iMac, and iPhone 4. Is that good enough.to hang around here? BTW … I do like the Note 2 better than the iPhone but that is mostly due to the size of the phone and the keyboard. The iPhone is way too small for me. I’ll seriously look at it beyond just a work phone when they significantly increase the screen size.

ob1spyker you do not have to have any Apple products to “hang around here” but keep in mind that this is an Apple fan site. If you are an Android fan and like to hang out here, feel free, just be mindful that you in “Apple territory” and be respectful.

I recall one of those hyperventilating types on one of the other Mac blogs hyperventilating over how the iPhone was doomed because Facebook Home. Of course now the site is scrubbed of the post, but nonetheless I recall how this was the “end of Apple”.

Does this surprise anyone? I wouldn’t put Facebook garbage on my iPhone. Hell, I wouldn’t put it on a Blackberry, android or windows phone, you think google is bad? Facebook is worse, I’m glad this POS phone failed.

Here’s the thing. I don’t know how many of you use Android phones, but for me the difference is in the singular vision of Apple, vs. the multiple ideologies attempting to work together on top of Android.

You’ve got Android, the Carrier, the Handset maker, and now Facebook wants to layer something on top of that? It’s already kind of a hodgepodge, people don’t need added crap. FaceBook should remain sandboxed in its own application the way god intended.

I have a new HTC ONE, and all things considered, it might be the best mobile handset I’ve ever used. HTC learned much from Apple and there are many things that Apple could learn from HTC. The screen is gorgeous, it makes using the phone as a media consumption device a really great experience. The front facing speakers are sublime. They are beyond amazing and in comparison, they put not only the iPhone but the iPad to shame. Really, you have to hear them to understand. It’s an all metal unibody design, very much like something Apple would build.

The primary issue is with Android. It’s just, I don’t know, kinda kooky. First thing you notice is that every email program you can find for Android looks like some primitive Palm OS email program. Under iOS, email is comparatively beautiful, with messages displaying as they would on the Mac. Under Android you typically get just jumbled text.

And that’s just where it starts. From one end of iOS to the other, things work as you’d expect. Under Android sometimes you can pinch and zoom other times you can’t you never know. There’s a dozen different ways you can set things like notifications, and hell, I’m still not sure how to get the dang vibration notification to stop from the build in mail. If you’re recording a video, and receive an email, the notification vibration and noises get recorded in the video. Lovely.

The built in browser is a piece of shit so it goes without saying that you’re going to download Firefox and/or Chrome or Opera. Figuring out from there how to make it the default browser is an exercise in Google research.

The experience is very much like being accustomed to the minimalist perfection of a BMW and then driving a well made, but gadget wacky Kia.

I do like the handling of multitasking as compared to the iPhone. I love the HTC added BlinkFeed home screen that’s kinda like having Flipboard built in, on the first screen which is a nice news/social media aggregation.

If I want a calendar that supports caldav I have to download one. Contacts, between AT&T’s software and the way Google handles things, I’m still not sure how to get it to operate the way I want.

Still I can see why people are excited about the new handsets from HTC and Samsung. They are pushing forward, rapidly, and I hope Apple picks up the pace a bit.

They’ve got some real competition now, and Jonny Ive’s acumen will be tested in the coming months.

I read your comment and it sounds like playing music without headphones is a major feature but the rest of the phone needs a little to a lot of refining to reach the ease of use we see with the iPhone.

I certainly don’t need to look at Android when I get my next cell phone.

No one wants to buy a newly designed phone for Facebook because they already have a phone they use for Facebook, an iPhone, (and the Samsung knockoffs) with Facebook apps that already satisfy their needs.

The days (and market) for this kind of singularly focused product is long since passed.

MDN Take great! Yes, it does reflect well on society. I am glad nobody wants this thing.
Look, Facebook works. It is a tool which unfortunately stands largely alone at the moment. But it is not “cool” and I don’t really know anybody older than 8 who actually thinks it is “cool”. As soon as the world provides the next thing that solves this space, the world will flee, and it will become an anachronism. Like waterbeds.

Although I am not a twitter head, I am liking the “lightness” of this format. You aren’t tied to friends. You can delete your tweets. Ultimately, there isn’t a bunch of crap being shoved down your ocular throat.

I go to Facebook, to “respect” my friends and relatives. Other than that, I have nothing to say there.